Dogs can get jealous, study suggests

The reaction of three border collies to being petted, and being ignored, inspired new research into whether dogs feel jealousy.

The New York Times News

Published: 23 July 2014 03:54 PM

Updated: 23 July 2014 05:49 PM

Any dog owner would testify that dogs are just as prone to jealousy as humans. But can one really compare Othello’s agony to Roscoe’s pique?

The answer, according to Christine Harris, a psychologist at the University of California, San Diego, is that if you are petting another dog, Roscoe is going to show something that Harris thinks is a form of jealousy — even if not as complex as the human form.

Harris had been studying human jealousy for years when she decided to take this question on, inspired partly by the antics of her parents’ Border collies. When she petted them, “one would take his head and knock the other’s head away,” she said. It certainly looked like jealousy.

Some scientists argue that jealousy requires complex thinking about self and others, which seems beyond the capabilities of dogs. Others think that just because our descriptions of jealousy are complex, that does not mean the emotion itself is that complex. Harris ventured into canine emotion by devising a test based on work done with infants.

When dog owners petted and talked to a realistic stuffed dog, the people’s own dogs came over, pushed the person or the stuffed dog and sometimes barked. Harris also recorded what happened as the owners petted a jack-o’-lantern and read a children’s book out loud, to see if any distraction would provoke a reaction. The dogs paid little attention to the jack-o’-lantern and very little to the book.

Harris concluded that the dogs showed a “primordial” form of jealousy — not as complex as the human emotion, but similar in that there is a social triangle and the dog is trying to make sure it, not the rival, receives the attention.

Other scientists had mixed reactions to the work. Alexandra Horowitz, a cognitive scientist and author of “Inside of a Dog,” said that the research had not shown that the behaviors observed actually indicated jealousy.

“What can be shown is that dogs seem to want an owner’s attention when there is attention being given out,” she said.

Whatever the dogs’ behavior is called, said Brian Hare, a director of the Duke Canine Cognition Center at Duke University, there are practical implications for their owners.

“Attention seeking can lead to jealousy-like behavior in dogs that includes aggression in some cases,” Hare said. “So for dogs with suspected aggression problems, it may be important to avoid situations where they feel ignored.”

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